Damn some crazy prejudice/ignorance going on in this thread. Let's throw some truth.
A lot of Indians (but fewer middle-class/rich ones in these times) wipe with water. They use their left hands to apply the water. They don't use their left hand to eat or to touch other people, and they think you nasty that you wipe yo butt with the same hand that you shake other people's hands with.
No one dips their hands into any water to wash it. You pour water out onto your hand. Usually running water, but in poor places you might pour it out of a little watering-can looking thing, but you would NEVER dip yo hand into the same water as other people. And they definitely use soap. People carry around this paper-soap stuff just in case there isn't soap available in the restroom.
No one washes anything in a toilet. That's some stupid foul shyt right there.
Everything said about crapping in public is true though. Hundreds of millions of people without access to a toilet. Tons of public places are way foul.
Everything said about their infrastructure just not being able to handle the population also true. Septic tanks and all that are built at least, but there aren't any large-scale water treatment plants available to the population.
And yeah, gap between the rich and poor is tremendous. Wealthy Indians are sick wealthy and there are a LOT of them. But some states in India are neck-and-neck with the poorest countries in Africa for their poverty, and with higher population density too.
Poor/low caste/minority Indians get hated on by the rich and privileged. So why you all hating on them too?
Ganges is certainly way polluted. But not like ya'all are making it out - I've seen it lots of times, and it always just looking like water to me. It's not like there's bodies/feces floating everywhere. But yeah, I'd be scared as hell to put my face under in that stuff.
Disease problems are enormous. Lots of reasons behind that, but population density, sanitation, education, and poor health services are some of the main ones. But 25% of doctors in the USA are Indians and Indians completely tear it up in our education system and are dominant in science. Indians are plenty smart enough to solve the problems, it's just that the corruption in the government and the massive divide between the rich and poor keeps the good stuff flowing to they that have and keeps the epidemics flowing to they that have not.
There's some real gender problems going on right now, real real tough on women. But try and cast the first stone on that one.